ArticleJournal of general internal medicine2026
Relationships, Resilience, and Relative Value Units: A Qualitative Study of the Promotion and Erosion of Humanistic Practice.
Article in Journal of general internal medicine, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
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Abstract
backgroundFormal medical curricula increasingly emphasize humanism, yet humanistic practice (HP) is often described subjectively and little is known about how practicing clinicians experience and develop HP within contemporary healthcare environments.
objectiveTo explore how practicing physicians conceptualize, develop, and experience HP, and to identify implications for undergraduate medical education.
designQualitative study using semi-structured focus groups.
participantsTwenty-six physicians across multiple specialties and 15 U.S. states participated, recruited through professional listservs, investigator networks, and snowball sampling. Years in practice ranged from 0 to 53 (mean ~ 18). APPROACH: Four 90-min virtual focus groups (six to seven participants each) were conducted in January-February 2023. Open-ended questions explored clinicians' understandings of HP and factors facilitating or impeding it. Transcripts were iteratively analyzed using thematic coding and reflexive discussion. KEY
resultsFive themes emerged. Clinicians described HP as relational and inseparable from competent care. HP was primarily cultivated through relationships with patients, mentors, and role models, and those humanistic relationships also supported clinician resilience. Participants noted ambiguities in defining HP and experienced substantial tensions between HP and healthcare system priorities focused on efficiency, standardization, and commercialization. The culture and pedagogies of medical training were also seen as undermining HP development, with clinicians describing their training as "damaging" to their native humanism.
conclusionsClinicians deeply value HP but face systemic and cultural forces that challenge its practice, making it essential to address both education and healthcare systems in sustaining humanistic care. Preparing future physicians to understand, resist, and creatively work within the constraints of an industrialized system is essential to ensuring that medicine remains a profoundly human endeavor.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.